Bird by Bird
This week I was extremely happy to shift gears away from poetry and get to read and write about a book that is about writing and life. While reading poetry and writing my own poetry has been extremely enlightening, it feels good to change pace and read something different. I was going to touch on the packets that we also read this week, but I decided it was better to just stick to one main topic. With this said, we will stick with writing about the novel we read called Bird by Bird, by Anne Lamott. It is a book that is mainly about instructions on writing and on life. After reading the first half of the book, I have learned a great deal. I find myself very enlightened about the everyday thoughts and actions of a writer. The reading really opened my eyes to the struggles of being a full time author/writer, and writing novels for a living.
I found that the Introduction at the beginning of the book was very important and a great way to start the book. Anne Lamott essentially describes her entire childhood all the way up to writing this book. She writes about the struggles that her father had as a writer, along with the struggles that she faced. She also writes about the successes they had writing and publishing their own books. I thought this was excellent. Not only did this section make Anne Lamott seem much more human, but seeing the struggles she faced and overcame makes her seem that much more credible. How in depth she was in the introduction about her own life was very enlightening as well. She spoke about how all her dad’s friends were also writers and they would all do heroin and smoke weed all the time. Then a couple pages later she discusses how all her dad’s friends that were writers ended up committing suicide. I also learned that many writers face these problems. I got the impression that writing for a living drives people crazy. I also enjoyed when she talked about how publishing a book won’t make a writer happy, that it is the process of writing the book that makes a writer feel like he or she is living up to something. Writing and working on a book makes the writer feel better and more alive than anything else.
A little deeper into the story in the section called short assignments, she talks about one of her favorite quotes. On page 18, she quotes, “Writing a novel is like driving your car at night. You can only see as far as your headlights, but you can make the whole trip that way.” She then says you don’t have to see where you’re going, you don’t have to see your destination or everything you will pass along the way. You just have to see two or three feet ahead of you. She then says that this is some of the best advice about writing or life that she has ever received. I couldn’t agree with her more. This is a great quote and excellent advice. A little later in the book she talks about perfectionism. On page 32 she writes, “Perfectionism is a mean, frozen form of idealism, while messes are the artist’s true friend.” I totally agree with this statement. Being a perfectionist will only lead to being very lonely. If you expect everything and everyone to be perfect then you and others will never meet your expectations. Nothing will ever be complete or good enough. The world is filled with imperfection. So even if a perfectionist was given the entire world, it wouldn’t be enough.
Finally, I found another section of the book hit home with me. It is on page 93 and is called, “How Do I Know When I’m Done”. This section appealed to me because I find myself asking this same question when I write. The section is only two pages long but gives a lot of insight into when to call it quits. On page 93, Anne Lamott writes, “I don’t quite know how to answer it”. It shows us that even published writers are never done correcting their work. She goes on to write, “There will always be more you can do, but you have to remind yourself that perfectionism is the voice of the oppressor”. I also have this problem when writing. I’m not a perfectionist and am normally happy with my writing in the end, but I always think there is something more I can correct or fix. This section, while short, has shown me that you have to finish things and move on to the next part. If you stay stuck on one section you will never get anything done. Reading the first half of Bird by Bird has taught me a lot about writing and how to help myself write better. Hopefully the second half is as insightful as the first half.
No comments:
Post a Comment